Do you realize that Albert Pooles has
a higher OPS this season at age 42 than
any season he had with the Angels,
and he was there for a decade?
It's one of the best baseball stories
ever told the baseball Gods giving him a
jolt to get him to 700 before he retires.
Albert is our sports Plus
Spotlight interview.
We sat him down earlier in the week.
Do you ever get used to seeing your
name next to Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron's?
That's a blessing. I I, you know.
I really don't put too much think
up too much thought about it,
but I also am aware of.
Where I'm standing in the
history of this game,
so it's not like I don't care just,
but for me, I think at the end
of the day it's about.
Getting myself ready,
helping this ballclub to winning and and
at the end of my career I think I'm gonna
have play anytime to look back really,
and enjoying the success that
I had in this game.
But it's synaptic right now.
It's hard for me to really focus
and to think about those things.
I've asked this already twice.
I know I'm going to ask a third
time and you won't respond,
but I'll just ask it.
Do you ever think about 700?
No, I don't.
Well, I never thought about 500.
I never thought about 100.
I got 695. So if it meant to happen,
it's gonna happen.
If no, then I think I.
More than overwhelming these and
bless of the career that I have.
So what I'm thinking about is winning
a championship for the city of
Saint Louis and this organization
and there's nothing they will
sacrifice me more than raising that
trophy at the end of November.
Are there similarities between this
team and your 2006 and 2011 team?
I think talent wise, I think obviously
this thing is better for you.
Look at it, I think we have great players.
Don't get me wrong. 06 and 2011.
We got great names in the back of the jersey,
but at the end of the day,
the young players that we have right now,
they're pretty special and
it's just a different era.
It's hard to compare.
I mean, because you end up going winning a
World Series this year, you're gonna compare.
At the end of the day,
you need to separate years by year.
You can't. It's hard to compare.
You know, I have so many guys and
play for so many great teams that
everybody was sweating also win
a war series and we never did.
And the guys in the years that
we did and we ended winning it.
So I think at the end of the day,
you know, it's.
Thankful,
saying it's hard to compare things like that.
You know,
you just need to enjoy the thing
that you have and try to do the
best you can to win a championship.
What about the phenomenon of how quiet
it now gets when you come to the plate?
First there's this big eruption,
then all of a sudden it's like a golf
tournament and how quiet that is. That's fun.
But I think for me,
I don't focus into all that.
Those are distraction.
I call in this game. I mean,
my job is to go out there and try to perform,
try to help this ballclub to
come big and that are bad.
Whenever I get an opportunity to play,
sometimes you do, sometimes you don't.
And this is the beauty of the game.
That's why I think. You're kinda.
Get better out every day and you wanna,
you know, be the best because you know
sometimes you're gonna fail in this game
more than the success that you have.
And that's that's why
this game is so awesome.
But I think, you know,
it is wrong and it's it's you know,
I shared on Sunday that Friday was
last Friday was the the first time,
you know, this year,
but I think the first time in a long
time that I really felt their energy
or the fans and it was just a little
bit different and I couldn't pick why.
Maybe because we were playing
against the cops, who knows?
But I played.
Hundreds and hundreds of
gang against singing.
I I never felt like this,
so it was pretty special.
What
do you think you're gonna be
doing next year at this time?
I don't know, maybe laying in the
beach in the Dominican Republic,
getting some black or something.
I don't know. Sometime, who knows?
I I can't think that far ahead.
I'm focusing on today's date.
And then when tomorrow comes,
focus on that, you know,
and really I don't like to make bigger
big plans like that and it couldn't be
any better than it is right now, is it?
No, it's perfect. I enjoy it.
I'm having a great time.
I feel like we have a great team and
obviously it's just, it's just different.
I think part of that is probably because,
you know, I guess I got less responsibility,
you know that I have probably
4-11 years when I was here.
So I don't know, I guess that's what it is.
So what I try to enjoy.
Enjoying the young players,
enjoying the fans, connecting back with them.
It's just, you know,
you can't ask for anything better than this,
especially to close this chapter of my life,
you know?
Championship will be, I mean, overwhelming.